Rite of Fall: Collecting Walnuts

One of the rites of fall here is collecting walnuts. Usually we will do this on our hikes around Badenweiler in southern Germany. In this area, there are many walnut and fruit trees that are left unharvested. We actually end up returning with heavier packs than we started with, plus our pockets are full as well.

Unfortunately Magda was forced in participating in the exchange between her school and the high school in Chillicothe, Illinois, due to the "illness" of one of the teachers who had originally signed on for the exchange (excuse my skepticism, but it is hard to understand why the success of an English language exchange depends on a part-time teacher who only part-time teaches English. Where are the teachers who teach English full-time?). So I have been picking up some walnuts under a couple of trees in the park that Frannie and I often walk. Usually we find a handful of nuts on each walk, but over time, as you can see, that can grow to a reasonable amount.

The walnut trees here are not the black walnuts that we typically see in Columbus, Ohio. Rather they are English walnut trees. One big difference is that as the nut ripen, they separate from their green cover. Sometimes they seem to spring from their covering and landing a fair distance from the tree. This makes them much easier to collect and make use of.

Around Koblenz, the walnut trees seem to grow best in the micro-climate of Rhine and Moselle valleys. It is usually just too cold and windy in the fields of the Eifel and Hunsruck (there is often a 5-8 degree C difference between Koblenz and the Eifel). The occasional tree that you find there are mostly in the villages where they are protected some from the climate. Further south, around Badenweiler, they can be found every where.

A couple of weeks ago, when the nuts started to ripen, there was quite a bit of competition for them. Every day there would be older couples and younger families out collecting the nuts from the trees in the park. Some would just pick up the nuts from the ground, but others were impatient and threw prices of wood into the the trees to try to knock the nut down. Now that we are at the end of the harvest, the competition has lessened. But still there are enough that I'm able to collect a new handful with each walk.

By the way, the green decoration on the nuts are hops. Hops grow wild here as well. I have noticed them on the banks of the Rhine and along the trail in the Eifel.